Many important discoveries happened by accident, and researchers at the Washington State University (WSU) had luck when they found out that exposing a crystal to light enables 400-fold increase of its electrical conductivity. The phenomenon, which lasted for days after the light was turned off, could dramatically improve the performance of devices like computer chips…. »

How many times you wished that your headphones had extra length or you ended up with tangled elastic electrical cord? North Carolina State University researchers are close to a great solution to these problems, since they managed to create conductive wires that won’t tangle and can function after being stretched up to eight times of… »

Current electronic devices are becoming faster and denser, but such complex circuitry is prone to reliability problems, and once one tiny circuit within an integrated chip breaks, the whole chip or even whole device is unusable. A team of University of Illinois engineers has developed a self-healing system capable to repair a cracked circuit by… »

It is only a matter of time when robots will be more similar or even more advanced than humans. One big step toward this idea was made in Tokyo University. Research group led by Takao Someya, has found electronic skin or E-Skin, a material of very high conductivity that is flexible like ordinary rubber. According… »